The more I thought about it,
the more I became convinced
that I had outsmarted myself
on this one. I had purchased
an original mechanism and
front door from a 1920 's Ba-
jazzo that had been attached
to a case made in the 1950's
or l 960's. I got out of bed,
turned on my computer and
reviewed the auction photos.
They only reinforced my fears.
To make matters worse, I had
some personal precedent for
this. The first British game I
ever purchased back in 1992, a
1950's allwin made by Oliver
Whales was actually a door
with mechanism that had been
put into a homemade case.
I did not discover this mistake until I had owned the
game for several years. Even so, the revelation left me
dumbfounded and heartsick. How could 1 have missed
something so obvious? At the time of purchase, it was
the first British game I had ever seen so I excused my
mistake due to ignorance but I promised myself at the
time that it was a screw-up I would never make again.
Sixteen years later, had
I just repeated the same
PhotoD
mistake but on a far
At this point I sat up in bed and thought,
grander and more ex-
"Holy Cow, have I just purchased a compos-
pensive scale? There
ite game with an original door and mechanism
was nothing to do now
mated to some lousy cheap allwin case?" To
but await Bajazzo's ar-
fully appreciate the apprehension I was feel-
rival.
ing, you need to understand that most British
I hate to imitate the
wall games have a standard oak case with a fiat
"Perils of Pauline," (a
top. The notable exception to the rule were
weekly serial adven-
games by a company called Wondermatics Ltd.
ture for those of you
of London. Photo E shows one of their all win
too young to remember
games with their trademark doomed tops. It
movies from the early
looks just like my Bajazzo top, doesn't it? I
years of cinema,) but
began to fear I had made one of the most el-
I've reached my COCA
ementary mistakes in collecting: decision by
Photo E
word limit for one article. Stay tuned
irrational exuberance instead of dispassionate
next time when we discover once and for
analysis.
all who is the real clown here!
THE END - FOR NOW!
photos from
the ad as a
series of pic-
tures m a
slideshow.
What I saw
this time were
two facts that
completely
eluded me pri-
or to my pur-
chase of this
game:
first,
Photo B
Photo B clearly
shows the hinges had something funny
going on and second, the top board of
the game was all wrong. Every Baja-
zzo I've ever seen, and I've seen several
dozen, have a fiat top to the game like
the one in Photo C. This Bajazzo had a
crown, Photo D.
Photo C
Post Script: Has your toast gone stale? Want to talk about it? Give me a jingle at (952) 891-23 I 2 or you can drop me a line at jp4@charte1:net.
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